Dr. David Scott Palmer

Palmer Department of International Relations
152 Bay State Road
Room G1
Boston, Massachusetts 02215
(617) 353-9388
(617) 353-9290 fax

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Professor of International Relations and Political Science. (BA, Dartmouth College; MA, Stanford University; PhD, Cornell University)

Specialization: Comparative Politics, International Relations, Latin American Studies.

David Scott Palmer has published five books, most recently U.S. Relations with Latin America During the Clinton Years: Opportunities Lost or Opportunities Squandered? (2006) His latest book manuscript, War and Peace in the Amazon:  Power, Institutions, and Political Leadership in Peru and Ecuador, 1995-1998, is under contract with the University of Texas Press.  He is also the author of more than 40 articles and book chapters on such topics as the Latin American military, democracy and its challenges, “informal politics” in highland Peru, guerrilla movements in Latin America and Nepal, the Peru-Ecuador border dispute and its resolution, and the consequences of asymmetry in U.S. relations with Peru. He consults regularly for the U.S. State Department, the National Intelligence Council, and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

At Boston University, Palmer has served as Chairman of the Political Science Department, Associate Chairman of the Department of International Relations, and as Director of Latin American Studies and Co-Director of Peru Summer, both programs that he helped to found. Before joining the Boston University faculty, he spent twelve years with the State Department as Chair of Latin American and Caribbean Studies and Associate Dean for Programs of the School of Area Studies at the Foreign Service Institute. He has also taught at a number of colleges and universities, including Bowdoin, Princeton, Georgetown, George Washington, The School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of Johns Hopkins, Salamanca (Spain), Catholic University (Peru), and The University of Chile. He served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Peru and was awarded a Fulbright Senior Lecturer Fellowship to the University of Huamanga (Ayacucho, Peru). Palmer held the Federico Gil Chair in Politics at the University of Salamanca, Spain during his sabbatical semester of Spring 2011.